Customer Reviews

The Executioner's Game

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

While Gary Hardwick is better known for his police thrillers, this book is a nice change of pace. It explores the area of espionnage with a twist.

I love Hardwick's down to earth and thoroughly readable style of writing. I am not a huge fan of espionnage books, but Hardwick made me literally devour this book. He writes humble and human characters and his plots are always a whodunnit til the end.

I still prefer to read Hardwick's police stuff, but this book was a nice change of pace.

Great, great.

Gary Hardwick fans won't be disappointed with his latest, The Executioner's Game. Using select rules from his main character's E-1 Operations Missions Manual, Hardwick sets a riveting stage for readers to be fully immersed into a well written spy-thriller that not only entertains, but stimulates thoughts about race and crime of the inner city and how the two are perceived by law enforcement. This novel clearly establishes Hardwick as a daring storyteller with the kind of verve and energy that will keep old fans wanting more and new

fans seeking out his other works. A great read to kick off the New Year (due to be released on or before January 1, 2005)!

I really enjoyed the characters in this journey of the governmental backwashers. The storyline and premise are fictional--or are they? The secretive governmental assassin program is purely fictional--right? And what about the conspiracy in the Motherland that describes events 1,000 times worse than Hitler's genocide; that is pure fiction--isn't it? Let me put it like this, if the author of this book is NOT under governmental surveilance,well......

The main character is a cold, calculating, patriotic governmental assassin who is 100% willing to sacrifice EVERYTHING and EVERYONE to complete his mission; that is, until he starts to uncover truths left by his "rogue" mentor that are beginning to make him analyze his loyalty and the government "brass" issuing the missions.

It's non-stop action from beginning to end! I highly recommend this author's work. He has the ability to transport you into the scenery and have your pulse quickening thru-out the action scenes. It's not too long or too short. He don't waste pages and pages of reduntant backstory stuff; gives U just enough to keep it rollin'.

If you enjoy suspense, conspiracy, assassins, honor and code type of stories, U better add this one to your collection mannnn!!

--BnHereB4

I'm not usually a big fan of books like this but I like Hardwicks others books. I wasn't disappointed by any means. This was so full of twists and turns it kept me turning the pages. I enjoyed this political thrill ride. This would make an excellent movie... hint..hint...

reviewed by

Dawnny

When I read novels in this genre I don't mind implausable plot twists and super-human heros, although I do prefer the nuances of, say, John Lecarre in which characters are fully developed. Some novels should be read just for the fun of it. I do have a problem when the author pays no attention to detail, apparently writing in a hurry.

For example, the protagonist, Luther Green, attended a prep school in Detroit, then went to high school. Let's suppose he was 17 or 18 at this time. He went to West Point and graduated with honors, a four year program. He intended to become an Army Ranger but instead got recruited to become an assasin for a secret department of the U.S. goverment and spent three years learning the trade. Okay, but then the author wrote that Luther Green was 21 years old when he was finally approved as an assasin and sent on his first assignment. New math? I could go on with further details, but you get the drift. Whatever happened to book editors who actually read the book?

Assassin Luther Green is a patriot. He serves his country in the way he knows best--by following orders and by killing those who are deemed a threat to the nation. When he's called back to headquarters, he knows this won't be a routine kill. Still, he's startled to learn that his next assignment is the man who brought him into E-1, the secret agency responsible for America's ultimate sanctions. Alex had trained him, inspired him, but now he's a threat to the country--and Luther knows how to follow orders. The only problem is, something about this particular job stinks.

It doesn't take Luther long to realize that he's following a trail that Alex has carefully laid down. Alex is trying to teach Luther something, show him something about E-1 that would prove that the Agency has gone off-wire. Luther isn't buying, and even if he did, he's been assigned a job and he intends to complete it.

Alex's trail takes him through the inner cities of Baltimore, Philadelphia, and finally Detroit--cities where drugs and guns cheapen life to the point where professional assassins fit right in. Alex's message is getting through, but Luther has sacrificed his entire life to his country and isn't about to be stopped. Only when the true coverup becomes known can Luther confront the real enemy.

Author Gary Hardwick delivers an exciting story of assassination, martial arts action, and inner-city drama. Making Luther a black protagonist in a profession dominated by whites adds to the conflict--and heightens his sense of betrayal when the secrets are finally revealed.

Hardwick's writing is occasionally clunky, but mostly workmanlike, moving the story along while deepening the reader's interest and buy-in to the characters. Overall, THE EXECUTIONER'S GAME is definitely worth the read.

Gary kept my attention throughout the book. I dug the non-stop action, tight dialogue and unpredictable plot. Nice job.

Marcus Love, author of Chameleon Lover

Luther Green is a government assassin working for an agency known as E-1. Luther is called off his current mission from somewhere overseas and brought back to America. The director of E-1 personally assigns him to a new assignment--find and kill the man who trained Luther as an agent, Alex Deaver.

Although Luther accepts the task, he finds that the director's behavior and the assignment odd. Deaver leads Luther on a cat and mouse chase that takes the reluctant assassin back to hometown, Detroit. It places Luther at a disadvantage because he has family and friends living in the city. Deaver's knows this and is willing to place Luther's family in the line of fire if he has to.

Deaver's leaves clues for Luther to discover while they play their Executioner's Game. And soon Luther finds that everything at E-1 is not what it appears to be.

Gary Hardwick's 'The Executioner's Game' is an exciting, fast-pace read, with interesting characters and a government assassin with a style all his own. Well worth the read.

[...]
Lost Hours
[...]

I made it to page 210 out of the 251, then didn't bother to finish. I couldn't muster up enough interest to care about what happens at the end. It had been slow going from the beginning and the only reason I continued was to find out the "big coverup." Once that was revealed, and it was shockingly underwhelming, I was through wasting my time.

If the back cover hadn't revealed that the writer was a screenwriter, I probably could have guessed. The major problem with the book is its inconsistent inclusion of descriptive detail. The only character thoroughly described and developed is a peripheral one. The two leads are little more that stock characters who get a couple of lines descibing them (compared to the couple of paragraphs for that peripheral one). The main supporting characters are practically stick figures.

The author takes great pains to describe the music Luther listens to (the movie soundtrack), yet just about every other detail is glossed over. There was one 3 or so page passage that felt like part of a novel - Alex reliving the explosion. It's too bad there weren't more like it. I think this story would have been more enjoyable if it had been a screenplay/script rather than badly masquerading as a novel.

I enjoyed the straight forward story and although I pretty much could see everything coming I still enjoyed the book's mysteries as they unfolded. The book is ultra-violent in places and I consider that a good thing. It was definately a page turner and I got through it very quickly. I've since read three other Hardwick books and consider this one of the better ones.